This is a really weird device. The mac mini has long been used as a home theater pc of the apple ecosystem, due to it's formfactor and being the one apple device that didn't come with its own 20 inch screen or 3 foot tall tower. Apple tv, for all it's shortcomings, has sort of supplanted that and you're much better off sticking that under your tv and running your plex server somewhere else. So now we have a mac mini which is too expensive to be a home theater pc or to be stuck in a closet serving media, and is comparably priced with macs that have actual screens. So its like good for someone who for some reason doesn't want to carry a macbook around but wants a semi-portable workstation? or someone who wants an iMac with a bigger screen? It's not useful as a mac mini, and it's pretty redundant thanks to every use case being covered by an existing mac. Who is this device for? Who is buying this over a macbook or imac?
2018 Mac Mini Review
521–530 of 653 posts
Re: 2018 Mac Mini Review
#522Earlier quoted context omitted.
Anyone who owns a MacBook Pro with Touch Bar will definitely be saying "yay it hasn't gotten worse!" about these.
I'm pretty happy with mine, but thanks for speaking for us all with your sweeping generalization.
It makes things universally worse imo. Everything was by touch for me previously, including adjusting sound. I had the keyboard memorized. Now I constantly have to look down. A keyboard shouldn't require me to change my focus, that defeats the entire purpose.
Re: 2018 Mac Mini Review
#523This is a really weird device. The mac mini has long been used as a home theater pc of the apple ecosystem, due to it's formfactor and being the one apple device that didn't come with its own 20 inch screen or 3 foot tall tower. Apple tv, for all it's shortcomings, has sort of supplanted that and you're much better off sticking that under your tv and running your plex server somewhere else. So now we have a mac mini…
Weirdly, it has a lot of enterprise-scale applications and implications with it's ability to accept 64GB of RAM.
We're replacing a ton of those 'garbage-can' Mac Pro models with them. Lord knows we don't need kick ass graphics cards.
In terms of consumer-level applications, it definitely seems like the sell used to be the pleasant $500 price point.
The G4 Mac Mini, at $499, was my very first entry into the Mac world. I certainly couldn't afford $1,100 for an iBook G4 in High School.
Re: 2018 Mac Mini Review
#524Macs aside - this video clearly shows the wonderful experience you can get when an audio/video producer cares about audio quality. Spoken word recorded with clear audio is so lovely. I listen to podcasts and audiobooks on a daily basis and I really really appreciate someone putting the effort into this. Thanks!
I had a hard time watching him talk because the over dubbed audio is completely out of sync. It's really bad right around the 1 minute mark. I ended up minimizing the window and just listening. I honestly don't care for this audio, it's crystal clear and perfect for a podcast but the video is of him sitting in front of a window with a dog and the absence of any environmental noise is odd.
"Yeah, sorry about the audio sync. I was fighting it for the entire edit, and ran out of time to really nail it.
Next time, I’ll pipe the audio directly into the camera instead of relying on manual syncing during post, which had tons of drift."
Re: 2018 Mac Mini Review
#525People are missing the point about the integrated graphics. For me this is a feature not a bug because it has USB-C instead. That means that instead of hopelessly compromising thermals and power supply with some power hungry, yet limited GPU (because of the small form factor) you simply buy the CPU and memory that you need. It simplifies the job of keeping it cool. CPUs are evolving a lot slower these days. This one…
What would you recommend for a Mac-compatible eGPU these days?
I have an HP Omen Accelerator with an RX580 and a 2016 MBPr and it's plug and play in macOS 10.14. Last I checked, you could get most Nvidia GPUs working, but it required some spelunking. It may be different now.
I've been very happy with it overall. I have a 4k 28inch monitor and a 30 inch Cinema Display plugged into the GPU, and the eGPU enclosure has a sata port + ethernet port. There are some gotchas, eGPU.io is a great resource.
Also, bootcamp with windows 10 works with my eGPU, but required some work. If you want more info, let me know.
Re: 2018 Mac Mini Review
#526Earlier quoted context omitted.
Probably price. $800 is pretty steep for the entry version, when you can buy a better equipped Lenonvo ThinkCentre for $200 less.
A Lenovo ThinkCentre is like 10x bigger than a Mac Mini. I wouldn't want one of those sitting in my living room. And my wife would absolutely forbid it. The only real competition I see for the Mac Mini is the little computers from System76. But they're about the same price.
My Lenovo ThinkCentre M710q is almost identical in size to my old (very) Mac Mini.
Re: 2018 Mac Mini Review
#527Re: 2018 Mac Mini Review
#528Earlier quoted context omitted.
Probably price. $800 is pretty steep for the entry version, when you can buy a better equipped Lenonvo ThinkCentre for $200 less.
Does that Lenovo have Mac OS?
Obviously it does not. And that's a pity. Whether or not that justifies a more than $200 difference is up to whoever wants to use it.
Re: 2018 Mac Mini Review
#529People are missing the point about the integrated graphics. For me this is a feature not a bug because it has USB-C instead. That means that instead of hopelessly compromising thermals and power supply with some power hungry, yet limited GPU (because of the small form factor) you simply buy the CPU and memory that you need. It simplifies the job of keeping it cool. CPUs are evolving a lot slower these days. This one…
What's the need for an eGPU if there's enough space for a GPU in the unit?
I long for a return to the Powermac G5 'basic tower' form factor.
Re: 2018 Mac Mini Review
#530Earlier quoted context omitted.
How is this statement accurate? > which would cost $2499 (much of which is the SSD) A 1TB SSD is maybe $200 retail?
A 1TB SSD is maybe $200 retail? For the cheap ones. The faster/better quality ones from Samsung and Intel, which are more comparable to what Apple is using, are $400-500
The 970 EVO performs noticeably better in almost all benchmark categories (latency, sequential read/write, 4K read/write) than Apple SSDs. The 970 EVO uses MLC.
The 970 EVO is $230.
Come again?